Added Value

High quality design and place making is the overarching principle of our approach to ‘added value’. With national, regional and local Government increasingly moving towards promoting good quality design, it is fundamental in achieving planning consents.

We add value to land by creating appealing homes, workplaces and environments. We also understand that high quality design adds value and desirability to new homes, buildings and places whatever the economic situation.

Our master plans are designed to improve people’s quality of life by regenerating previously run-down areas, and creating new communities with character and identity. Indeed, when considering development opportunities such an added value approach is highly important and assists us in securing planning permissions in today's challenging development environment.

Three key ways

We believe our responsible approach to development creates added value in three fundamental ways:

• We have extensive experience in investing in place-making and design that creates both a premium over local values and a lasting legacy.
• Our approach to development supports us in obtaining planning consents through promoting sustainability - economically, socially and environmentally.
• Our reputation and approach to collaborative working relationships with stakeholders, including local authorities and public agencies, means that landowners and their advisers often prefer us when choosing their development partner.

Countryside Properties has a reputation for integrity and straightforwardness which underlies everything we do. We work with our partners to capture the full value of land in the long-term. We also have a strong track record of creating value in areas that are considered by others to be marginal.

• Much of the land in the Group’s control is located in the Government’s designated growth areas of the Thames Gateway, the M11 Corridor and the Northern Way.

• In 2008 79% (2007: 93%) of our residential output was on brownfield and recycled urban land, well above the Government’s target of 60% by 2008 which we have surpassed every year since 2001.

  
• We are provisionally claiming £1.301million tax relief for the remediation of contaminated land during financial year 2006/7 (2005/6 £2.278million).

St Mary’s Island

Added value at St Mary's Island

St Mary’s Island, Chatham Maritime, extensive remedial works, left a flat, virtually featureless, site. Structural landscaping and earth mounding were implemented across the island that has provided shelter and improved the visual impact of the site. Very high standards of planning, design and sustainability have been the critical factors in the success of this multi-award winning scheme. They have enabled us to create a much stronger demand for housing for sale than exists elsewhere in the sub-region.

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James Buxton, Senior Partner, Bidwells

Cliveden Village, Taplow, Bucks

Greenwich Millennium Village, London

Skyline120, Braintree, Essex